Throughout the ages games of skill and chance have always enjoyed a consistently high level of popularity, which has only grown during the past century as industrial revolution, and subsequent ever-growing technological and scientific advances, have provided the populace with greater and greater amounts of leisure time available to play various games.
While there are a vast number of different types of games, among the most popular and addictive, are “puzzle-based” games. Before proceeding further, it would be helpful to provide simplified definitions of games and puzzles and of their key characteristics:                1) A “game” can generally be defined as “a physical or mental competition conducted according to rules, with the participants in direct competition to each other”. In terms of some of its key characteristics, a typical game:                    a) is designed for a plurality of players; and            b) has a commercial value that is reflected in its adoption i.e., the more satisfying a game is to play, the more people play it, i.e., a greater level of adoption, equates to greater commercial value.                        2) A “puzzle” can generally be defined as “a question, problem or contrivance designed for testing ingenuity.” In terms of some of its key characteristics, a typical puzzle:                    a) is designed for use by a single person,            b) derives its intrinsic value from the satisfaction one receives upon successful completion (of a question, problem or contrivance), where a puzzle's adoption is inversely proportional to intrinsic value. The more difficult a puzzle is to complete, the fewer people complete it (i.e. leading to a lesser degree of adoption), while the more difficult a puzzle is to complete, the greater the satisfaction received (e.g., the intrinsic value) upon completion.                        
Puzzle-based games combine varying amounts of the above-described game and puzzle characteristics and may be generally separated into three categories as follows:                1) Pattern matching puzzles (PMPs): which present the player with a list of patterned elements (words, symbols, colors, etc.). The player is then challenged to find (e.g., “match”) identical patterns of in a larger field made up of similar pattern elements. Word-search is an example of a pattern matching puzzle;        2) Pattern completion puzzles (PCPs): which present the player with a field (e.g., a grid) of incomplete patterns and challenge the player to complete the patterns in accordance with a set of predetermined rules known to the player. Sudoku, Rubik's Cube, Chinese Picture Puzzles and Scrabble are examples of pattern completion puzzles; and        3) Combination puzzles (PMP/PCP): which present a combination of both pattern matching and pattern completion challenges. Jig-saw and crossword puzzles are examples of such combination puzzles.        
As can be readily seen from above, the greatest challenge in designing a successful puzzle-based game is the fact that a puzzle-based game built using difficult/high intrinsic value puzzles will result in lower adoption rates—i.e., the more and rewarding the game, the smaller amount of people will be interested in playing it. Of course there are a number of other very significant challenges in designing and providing a successful puzzle-based game. These challenges include, but are not limited to, the following:                1) Puzzles do not lend themselves to being implemented in games without the addition of rules, over and above the basic rules inherent in an individual puzzle;        2) Puzzles are binary—meaning that a typical puzzle can only be classified as “complete/solved” or “incomplete/unsolved”;        3) When the embodiment of a puzzle game is implemented as an application on a personal computer based or other data processing platform, puzzle-solving software may be employed to solve, or circumvent, the puzzles that are used as the basis of the game;        4) When puzzles that are used as the basis of a game for a plurality of players are too simple, the resulting game-play is non-satisfying (e.g., resulting in too many “ties”);        5) When puzzles that are used as the basis of a game for a plurality of players are too complex, the resulting game-play is non-satisfying. (games take too long, less skillful players become frustrated);        6) When a time-element is employed in a puzzle-based game, and the when the winner thereof, determined from a plurality of players, is based on whoever completes a puzzle first, the resulting game-play is one-dimensional and non-satisfying (i.e., the most skillful players usually win); and        7) When all puzzles that are used as the basis of a game for a plurality of players are identical, the resulting game-play is one dimensional and non-satisfying.        
It would thus be desirable to provide a novel and versatile system and method for selectively combining predetermined elements and rules from puzzle-based games, skill-based games, and wagering games, to form a plurality of a new novel class of platform-independent games playable by at least one player in a competitive manner comprising skill, puzzle, and wagering components, with an optional addition of the element of time.
It should also be noted that throughout the ages games of skill and chance have always enjoyed a consistently high level of popularity, which has only grown during the past century as industrial revolution, and subsequent ever-growing technological and scientific advances, have provided the populace with greater and greater amounts of leisure time available to play various games.
Among the most significant game-related technological advances of the past two decades have been the implementation, and rapid proliferation, of many well-known games of different types in an Internet-based (or “online”) gaming environment. Such “on-line” game incarnations have included, but have not been limited to: small-group or player vs. computer skill/luck wagering games (e.g., poker, other card games), collaborative “networked” multi-player versions of previously single-player computer/console games (such as “first-person-shooters”, etc.), massive multiplayer online role-playing/strategy games with up to hundreds of thousands of players participating in richly developed online game environments on a long-term ongoing basis, as well as online versions of conventional single-player games of skill, such as puzzle-based games (e.g., Sudoku, Wordsearch, etc.).
In recent years, exponential increases in popularity and utilization of online (and cross-platform capable (e.g., mobile device)) social networking platforms (such as Facebook, etc.), as well as Internet-based (or “online”) gaming, has resulted in explosive growth of an entirely new category of online games, commonly referred to as “casual games” that typically comprise easy to use and learn games that are playable in conjunction with user utilization of one or more compatible social networking platforms, and that typically rely on at least some social networking features of the platforms' to interact with other designated players associated with the user therethrough. A good number of such casual games revolve around resource management and selection of simplified strategic options, while many other casual games offer gameplay based in whole or in part on well known games long-available in other formats (such as simplified online poker and equivalents).
Casual online games have also become very valuable properties, because many casual games include “virtual in-game currency” features that make the games very profitable for companies offering them, at least in part because they essentially and legally circumvent the regulatory restrictions on online gambling, by instead selling non-redeemable virtual currency (usable in-game) to the players.
However, typical casual game offerings provide little satisfaction to most users and often fail to hold user interest for an extended period of time, instead relying on user turnover. Moreover, most currently available competitive online games (and especially turn-based multi-player games (such as many casual games), suffer from a common core drawback. Joining a typical online turn-based game (such as a poker game) requires players to first undergo a frustrating and time-consuming process of locating a game session (e.g. a “table”) with an available slot (e.g., “seat”), and then joining it. Moreover, organizing a new game session is typically an even more time consuming and frustrating experience. While many game companies have tried to simplify these processes, their attempted solutions are typically little more than afterthoughts, most commonly comprising virtual “lobbies” or equivalents deployed en masse on different servers, with scrollable lists of active and available games. Moreover, the huge number of players of such games results in many game companies offering game selection interfaces with scrollable lists of literally thousands of game sessions making the game selection and joining process even more frustrating and difficult.
Accordingly the majority of users tend to select any game session that is available with little interest or emotional investment (other than the session's parameters (e.g., the stakes—the amount of currency that one needs to bring to the table) in a particular game session itself. In short, the processes of locating and selecting a game session is a “necessary evil” that does not positively impact, or add value to, the user's gameplay experience.
It would thus also be desirable to provide a novel and versatile system and method for providing and managing an online game environment and related infrastructure that may be readily adapted and configured for advantageous utilization and implementation therein of different multi-player online games in which the processes of selection by players of particular virtual gameplay sites for entry into, and participation in, one or more games offered therein, are seamlessly incorporated into the game environment and infrastructure as integral aspects of overall “gaming experience” and that offer users a separate layer of gameplay in the utilization thereof.